Signal manipulation based on perceptual thresholds enhances surface experience with common haptic device

This paper presents evidences of the performance improvement due to perceptual-based force signal manipulation in an interaction task with an haptic device. We hypothesize that sub-threshold forces become perceivable when a vibration waveform is superimposed onto the force signal. We study the human capabilities in perception of harmonic forces, and we observe lower thresholds for sinusoidal waves than for onset force. Starting from these perceptual findings, we involve a frequency signal instead of a signal amplification to allow the tactile human sensors to sharpen the perception of sub-thresholds forces in a teleoperation task. We report on the results obtained from our experiments and on the method used to reach such goal.